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The Problem with Following the Science

How Kevin Sabet caused the problem that he's trying to solve

by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

October 25, 2022



2025 update



"If there is a problem with marijuana use, folks like Kevin Sabet caused it by championing a Drug War that gives us no psychoactive substances to use EXCEPT for marijuana. It's as if Kevin had outlawed everything but 2% milk and then screamed about the fact that 2% milk was far too popular!"

-the Drug War Philosopher


When Obama took office, he said he wanted to "follow the science 1" when it came to "drugs." I wish he had decided to follow the constitution instead. Because what Obama failed to realize, or at least failed to admit, is that science is not free in a Drug War society. Just look at all the articles about so-called "drugs" on academia.edu. You'll see hundreds of papers about misuse and abuse, but nary one about how drugs like MDMA could be used therapeutically to end school shootings, or how the chewing of the coca leaf could cure depression, or how psychedelics can improve one's appreciation of music, or how morphine 2 can give one an intense appreciation of Mother Nature. For it never occurs to a scientist in a Drug War society that demonized substances can be used in any positive way whatsoever. And so when we "follow the science 3" of these self-censored scientists, we naturally conclude that we must do everything we can to ratchet up the War on Drugs, this despite the fact that the kinds of drugs we criminalize today have inspired entire religions, as Soma inspired the Vedic-Hindu religion and the Incas and Mayans venerated coca and mushrooms respectively.

Had Obama and company followed the constitution instead, they would have outlawed the Drug War entirely as a violation of the natural law upon which that document was based. Instead, they "followed the science," which, in their view, told them they were duty bound to return cannabis to Schedule I, thereby "protecting" users (apparently by throwing them in prison for decades at a time and removing them from the voting rolls). I say they followed the science "in their view" because Obama's drug policy advisor Kevin Sabet has a very different take on the dangers of marijuana than does Professor David Nutt of England, the UK drugs expert who lost his job for suggesting that some criminalized substances were less dangerous than Big Pharma meds. In any case, it's odd that America's first black president would want to sign off on a change that would send still more blacks to jail in a country where the black suffrage has already been decreased by millions thanks to the war on psychoactive plant medicine.

But "following the science" is wrong for other reasons (as if disenfranchising blacks and thereby handing elections to racists was not enough). Even if we grant that "the science" is telling the whole story about psychoactive medicine (which is almost the exact opposite of the case), America is statistically challenged when it comes to interpreting that "science." Yesterday, I saw a tweet referring to an alleged death by overdose of marijuana, which if true would be the first death of its kind. The "tweeter" crowed that if the story was true, it would change the entire discussion about marijuana. But that is absolute nonsense. All substances can be fatal at some dosage. If you kept drinking lamb's milk, your stomach might eventually rupture, but that is no reflection on lamb's milk, but rather on the idiocy of those who drink it to such bizarre excess. Yet in the age of a "Drug War," Americans actually believe that they can trash a substance if they can associate it with one single negative outcome, this in a country in which half a million die yearly from using alcohol and tobacco, a fact that Drug Warriors never even notice.

That's how Brits trashed Ecstasy4. They associated it with a handful of highly publicized raver deaths, thereby concluding that the science was telling them that Ecstasy was deadly. But the deaths in question were actually caused by the Drug War itself, which taught kids to fear psychoactive medicines rather than to understand them. Had Drug Warriors merely told the kids to remain hydrated during use, there would have been no deaths from Ecstasy (except, perhaps, if someone decided to take the drug in bizarrely huge doses, in the way that the alleged cannabis mortality mentioned above used cannabis).

And yet Kevin Sabet's viewpoint is the mainstream view, supported by Jimmy Carter and The Atlantic. But then I shouldn't be surprised. The Atlantic is the magazine which publishes feel-good articles about treating depression, none of which even mentions the fact that the Drug War has outlawed all the hundreds of medicines that could do just that. Nor is it just their reporters that ignore this 6,400-pound gorilla. The very scientists that the reporters interview write and speak as if psychoactive substances do not exist. I guess that helps them sleep at night, because it would surely be depressing for a scientist to admit to him or herself that their research is being hampered by Drug War laws and ideology.

One wants to scream at the Kevin Sabets of the world: "It's the prohibition, stupid!" But as long as government insiders like Sabet can keep the focus on evil "drugs," we can ignore the devastation that our Drug War has caused south of the border, the way it has corrupted police forces and government offices, and put the poor in harm's way, not because they were using drugs but because they were advocating social policies with which the US government takes issue.

Yet there's still another way in which "following the science" is wrong. It's all well and good to "follow the science 5" when it comes to approving the use of physical medicine (though in reality much of that process is surely fraught with politics as well), but psychoactive medicine is used for subjective purposes like finding spirituality, increasing mental focus, combating life-destroying self-doubt, etc. Safety is certainly a consideration in such substance use, but it is neither the only consideration nor the most important one. Like the fictional Sherlock Holmes, Robin Williams chose to use cocaine 6 7 regularly (rather than, say, choosing to use those anti-depressants upon which 1 in 4 American women are dependent for life). That coca alkaloid helped him become the person he wanted to be. When the government countermands such choices, it is tacitly saying the following: that safety is more important than one's self-actualization in life -- and that is a false statement for most living, breathing persons. Is safety the most important thing for a free climber, or for an astronaut, or for a stuntman? No. So following the science is wrong, if by that we mean keeping Americans as safe as possible.

Besides, America has tried to keep young people safe for over a century now and look at the results:

We have turned inner cities into war zones, militarized law enforcement, corrupted the armies and police forces of South America, empowered a self-described Drug War Hitler in the Philippines, created the psychiatric pill mill 8 thanks to which 1 in 4 American women are dependent for life on Big Pharma meds, Nazified the English language, thrown elections to racists by disfranchising blacks, and put godsend medicines off-limits to silently suffering millions around the globe.

We have thus protected young people from "drugs" in the same way that the governess protected Miles from the imaginary Peter Quint in "Turn of the Screw" by Henry James, by a campaign of irrational hysteria that ultimately caused the very problems that it was allegedly seeking to prevent. Indeed, the "downsides" of prohibition are so obvious and so manifold that one cannot help but suspect that the goal of the Drug War was to create this dystopia in the first place, a thesis which becomes all too believable for those who dare to read Dawn Paley's 2014 book called Drug War capitalism 9 10.

Of course, if naturally occurring substances are dangerous, then surely a free and scientific country would teach about them, not criminalize them in violation of natural law. For plants and fungus are not obliged to meet FDA standards. They are God's (or the universe's) gift to us, and it's our job to use them as safely as possible.

If Kevin REALLY wanted to cut back on marijuana use, he would call for the immediate re-legalization 11 of the coca leaf to give users alternatives. But he's bamboozled by Drug War propaganda into thinking that "drugs" are some objective category of evil substances that we all are duty-bound to ignore.

That is not science, Kevin, it's Christian Science, the religion that tells us that we have a moral duty to refrain from using drugs.



Author's Follow-up: January 5, 2025

picture of clock metaphorically suggesting a follow-up




Following the science, indeed. If human beings had "followed the science" in the Indus Valley 3,500 years ago, there would be no Hindu religion today! If we had "followed the science" according to Kevin Sabet's prejudices, there would be no jazz music today.

Following the science today in the age of the Drug War is like following a blind man. Scientists are dogmatically blind to the obvious benefits of drug use. They do not care about anecdote. They do not care about history. They do not care about how much a substance makes someone laugh -- nor how much they look forward to use, thereby boosting their mood indirectly. They insist that efficacy show up under a microscope. That is pharmacological colonialism. It is the philosophy of behaviorism, which renders its devotees oblivious to psychological common sense. This tone-deaf mindset makes possible a blatantly mendacious drug scheduling system that tells us that drugs that have inspired entire religions have no known benefits. The DEA should be abolished for this blatant colonialist lie and agency heads should be thrown in jail for lying in such a way as to keep hundreds of millions of suffering human beings from using godsend medicine, much of which grows at their very feet.

Science today is all about demonizing substances, not approving them. That's why we have a National Institute of Drug Abuse and not a National Institute of Drug Use. Under the cover of reductive materialism 12, they "approve" drugs at a glacial pace, insisting that they can be approved only for one board-certified "illness" at a time, thereby limiting monetary loss for Big Pharma 13 14 in the rare event that the FDA finally does okay a heretofore demonized psychoactive substance. This is pharmacological colonialism, however, holding holistic-working drugs to the standards of reductive materialism. It is an inhumane disgrace justified by a fearmongering campaign that purposefully creates as many problems as possible for users. It is a war against human progress and against democratic principles. It was the Drug War that convinced Americans to give up on the Fourth Amendment and it is the Drug War which censors free speech and puts bureaucrats in charge of deciding whether a religion is sincere or not. What an absolute disgrace.

If you're a politician and you want to appear progressive about drugs without really changing anything (or you want to make things even worse), then you simply say we're going to "follow the science 15." You say this because you know that science as practiced today discounts all obvious drug benefits and holds drugs to a standard of safety that can never be met. There are more important things than materialist science, however. There are human emotions, the quest for spirituality, the quest for psychosocial improvement. The U.S. Constitution is more important than materialist science as well. Let's follow the Constitution, not materialist science, and stop using drug laws to limit how and how much human beings are allowed to think and feel in this world.



Author's Follow-up: January 23, 2025

picture of clock metaphorically suggesting a follow-up




Obama "followed the science" and further demonized marijuana on that basis. He failed to realize that the question is not, can marijuana be problematic in certain people at certain doses in certain usage patterns in certain circumstances?

The real issues are far more subtle and numerous than that. Here are just a few of the considerations that "scientific" Drug Warriors never consider in designing drug policy:

1) Does outlawing marijuana even make sense given that it is a g--blasted plant??? Isn't it straightforward tyranny to run interference between humanity and Mother Nature?

2) Won't cracking down on a much-desired substance create drug gangs and inner-city violence and corrupt entire governments south of the border? If you're so worried about safety, why is this question never part of your moral calculus?

3) If a drug can be problematic in certain doses at certain times in certain use patterns and certain contexts, isn't the answer education? The fact is, ANY substance can be dangerous in certain doses at certain times in certain use patterns and certain contexts. Why are we even contemplating arrest for those who undertake this risk while those who wield guns carelessly or binge-drink are free to endanger themselves and others?

4) What about the people who cut down or eliminate alcohol use thanks to their use of marijuana? Is that not a benefit to such drug use?

We should no more outlaw marijuana because there are "stoners" than we should outlaw liquor because there are alcoholics. Indeed, even a scientist would prefer that their friends be stoners rather than alcoholics, if that were the only two options available. Marijuana has killed no one, strictly speaking, while inspiring the music genre called jazz. Liquor, on the other hand, kills 178,000 each year in the United States alone, while "inspiring" countless car crashes and wife beatings.









Notes:

1: Time to stop following the science DWP (up)
2: Three takeaway lessons from the use of morphine by William Halsted, co-founder of Johns Hopkins Medical School DWP (up)
3: Time to stop following the science DWP (up)
4: How the Drug War killed Leah Betts DWP (up)
5: Time to stop following the science DWP (up)
6: Sigmund Freud's real breakthrough was not psychoanalysis DWP (up)
7: “Freud on Cocaine : Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive.” 2023. Internet Archive. 2023. https://archive.org/details/freudoncocaine0000freu/page/n5/mode/2up?view=theater. (up)
8: Antidepressants and the War on Drugs DWP (up)
9: What the drug war tells us about American capitalism DWP (up)
10: ThriftBooks. 2026. “Drug War Capitalism.” ThriftBooks. 2026. https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/drug-war-capitalism/9217021/?resultid=e8667266-257a-41bf-83e3-78200e3527f3#edition=8539401&idiq=10283063. (up)
11: “National Coalition for Drug Legalization.” n.d. National Coalition for Drug Legalization. https://www.nationalcoalitionfordruglegalization.org/. (up)
12: How materialists lend a veneer of science to the lies of the drug warriors DWP (up)
13: Seife, Charles. 2012. “Is Drug Research Trustworthy?” Scientific American 307 (6): 56–63. https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican1212-56. (up)
14: LaMattina, John. n.d. “Why Is Biopharma Paying 75% of the FDA’s Drug Division Budget?” Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnlamattina/2022/09/22/why-is-biopharma-paying-75-of-the-fdas-drug-division-budget/. (up)
15: Time to stop following the science DWP (up)
16: CDC. 2024. “Facts About U.S. Deaths from Excessive Alcohol Use.” Alcohol Use. July 8, 2024. https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/facts-stats/?CDC_AAref_Val=https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/features/excessive-alcohol-deaths.html. (up)




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Ten Tweets

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Just saw a People's magazine article with the headline: "JUSTICE FOR MATTHEW PERRY." If there was true justice, their editorial staff would be in jail for promoting user ignorance and a contaminated drug supply. It's the prohibition, stupid!!!

I've always wondered why we don't just let heroin users be -- or better yet, re-legalize drugs and give them choices. Why are they punished for using heroin daily while we praise 1 in 4 women for taking an even more dependence-causing drug every day of their life?

I have yet to find one psychiatrist who acknowledges the demoralizing power of being turned into a patient for life. They never list that as a potential downside of antidepressant use.

The Drug War is based on two HUGE lies: 1) that prohibition has no downsides, & 2) that drug use has no upsides.

Drug prohibition is the perfect racist crime. It brought gunfire to inner cities, yet those who seek to end the gunfire pretend that drug prohibition has nothing to do with it.

My consciousness, my choice.

Some fat cat should treat the entire Supreme Court to a vacation at San Jose del Pacifico in Mexico, where they can partake of the magic mushroom in a ceremony led by a Zapotec guide.

Pundits tell us that there are medical reasons not to "snort" cocaine. So what? There are medical reasons not to drive a car: you may have an accident. The question is: does cocaine use or car driving make sense in a given case! Details matter!

Another problem with MindMed's LSD: every time I look it up on Google, I get a mess of links about the stock market. The drug is apparently a godsend for investors. They want to profit from LSD by neutering it and making it politically correct: no inspiration, no euphoria.

Thomas Szasz was not an extremist when it comes to drugs. The extremists are those who feel that psychiatrists know more about our mind and mood than we do.


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Break the ice with a sledgehammer: place this book on your coffee table.

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